Supafly.com

This was first published on my blog on Suns.com:

For those of you who missed the game last night, you missed a lot:

1. Leandro is getting traded. The fan favorite Leandro Barbosa was called in his Los Angeles hotel room yesterday afternoon and was told that Steve Kerr needed to speak to him in the lobby. Apparently, Leandro had been traded to the New York Knicks. A stunned and emotional LB went to his mentor Dan Dantoni’s room and asked, “Do you not like me? I thought you liked me?” Dan barked back at him, “You’re not getting traded!”
Lesson Learned: Famous people shouldn’t use their real names when they check in at a hotel.

2. Mike D’Antoni and Kobe Bryant are great friends. I knew that young Kobe grew up in Italy admiring the explosive play of the superstar Mike D’Antoni. It’s rumored that Kobe adopted D’Antoni’s #8 as his own for several years before he changed to #24 in 2006. Last night we saw Mike and Kobe laughing together on the sidelines. This his hardly evidence of a life-long friendship, but it’s news to most Phoenicians.

Lesson Learned: Sports commentators need to learn to use the word “frenemy.”

3. Boris Diaw can still shoot. If you’ve been a Suns fan over the past few years, you’ll remember that Boris Diaw can hit critical shots in big games. Last night against the Lakers, Boris sunk 9 of 13. It feels good to see confidence in Boris again.

Lesson Learned: Boris needs to get in touch with his inner tiger.

4. Lamar Odom wears girl’s tights. I don’t want to be the fashion police, but some things need to said. Dwayne Wade debuted his black leotard bottoms to the world a couple seasons ago when his Miami Heat stormed the NBA playoffs and brought Miami home its first championship trophy. His training staff justified Dwayne Wade’s pantie hose as “leg warmers” that kept his muscles limber. Since then, Kobe and Lebron have been seen rockin’ the tights. (At least Lebron has the common sense to grow a burly beard to keep his manliness.) This trend is growing and is causing great trepidation in my life. Last night I suffered through almost 3 hours of watching big and bad Lamar Odom wear purple tights under his gold shorts.

Lesson learned: That ain’t right.

5. Steve Nash is funny. Some of you missed this because you were already in bed for the night. TNT’s courtside clown Craig Sager asked Steve Nash after the game why the Suns seem to be struggling in the first part of the year. Nash listened patiently as Sager stretched a question out over 30 seconds before he finally blurted back: “It’s because we suck!” Steve continued with a straight forward appraisal of the team’s struggles, but it was clear that Steve was in a funny mood after the big game. Sager’s second question was why we haven’t seen more aggression out of Boris Diaw. Nash yelled into the microphone “It’s because he sucks too!” Sager ended the interview before Steve Nash could tell him that he sucks as well.

Lesson Learned: Craig Sager needs new clothes.

This was first published on my blog on Suns.com:

Today is my 29th birthday. If I was a player in the NBA, I supposed I’d be a “veteran” by now.

I know this because I was watching the Utah Jazz’s Matt Harpring shoot free throws when the commentator described him as an “NBA veteran.” This was (kind of) deeply disturbing to me because Matt and I went to Georgia Tech together in the late 1990s. Although we never met one another on campus, I like to think we would’ve been good friends because we had so much in common. We’re both named Matt, we went to Georgia Tech, great hair, and the ladies like us. You can understand why I was offended when the commentator implied that Matt and I were getting old. I turned off the TV and cranked up Tupac.

It’s bizarre when you realize that your heroes are younger than you. This month our own Amare Stoudemire and Leandro Barbosa both turned 25. Hypothetically, if I was a bully and I was raised in Brazil, I could’ve beaten Leandro in a game of 1-on-1 and perhaps in a brawl over a hard foul. I mean really, what could a 3rd grade Leandrino have done against me the mighty 7th grade stud?

I can’t make the same claim against Stoudemire because he’s been beating up 7th graders since he was five–the same year he got his first tattoo.

Since I’m on the subject…Amare has to be the most intimidating dude in the NBA. Yeah Big Ben Wallace is, well, big. But you can’t take him too seriously with that ‘fro. Anyway you look at it, Amare is intimidating. Even when he was injured and sitting the bench in his suit, he blocked two shots a game just by staring down the jump shooters. He’s “hell boy” even when he’s standing still.

As I type this, there is a four-inch tall bobble head of Amare on my desk. I stole from a co-worker last season. When I get angry at my computer, I slam my fist on the desk and my little Amare nods his head to agree with me. That’s the only time mini-Amare seems cool with me. The rest of the time he just cocks his head to the right with a stare of disappointment and disbelief. Even with a stubby body and a massive head, Amare intimidates me–a grown man.

I shouldn’t be too self-conscious about turning 29 because there are a lot of guys playing in the NBA who are older than me. Although I don’t like the Clipper’s Sam Cassell, mostly because he made those awful faces in the 2006 playoffs, he’s living proof that old guys rule. The man is 38-years-old. He was born in 1969, the same year as Woodstock, the same year that “…the age of Aquarius…” was the number one song.

But Sam’s a baby compared to Houston’s Dikembe Mutombo, born 1966. Do the math. 2007 - 1966 = 41 years of awesome. I’d love to play Mutombo 1-on-1 just so I could get dunked on by a guy who’s only 14 years away from getting senior citizen discounts at most restaurants.

I shouldn’t be discouraged by my age. Good things happen with time. Look at Steve Nash. Although he’s always been a good player, his league domination didn’t start until he got out of his 20s. He got his first MVP award not long after he turned 31, then he did it again at age 32. He’s 33 now, and he’s still playing at MVP caliber. Everyone knows he’s going to play into his 40s. This is good news for all of us.

I feel so much better now. I’m only 29. I have all year to prepare for the world-domination that begins at age 30. It’s fair to say that 2009 is going to be a good year for me. By then I’ll have earned back-to-back MVB. Most Valuable Blogger.

Sunday night I gave the baccalaureate speech for Mountain View High School in NE Mesa. It was an honor to give the keynote in front of the proud graduates in the caps and gowns. Half-way through my talk, I explained the importance of using your life to lift others up. That we aren’t made to take everything in this world for ourselves we were made for more. I explained that this world needs more players like Steve Nash. Someone who makes everyone else around them better. Every head started to nod in the church walls.

:::

The Suns got knocked out of the NBA playoffs. It’s been melancholy around town, and I haven’t been in the mood to write about it. Candyce and I were downtown at Stoudemire’s restaurant to watch Game 5 at home against the Spurs. We were without Diaw and Stoudemire because of an unjust rule in the NBA that killed us in the closing seconds of Game 4 in San Antonio. We won that game, but we were punished in the series.

Stoudemire’s restaurant was proud and rowdy. Even the kitchen crew came out into the restaurant to watch the final quarter of the game. The place was a happy riot until the final minutes of the game. The Suns came up a few points short in the final minute, and we lost the game. Slowly, the crowd emptied into the streets. Nobody spoke. Everyone just walked to their cars, stunned by the reality of our bad fortune.

On our walk to the packed streets past the stadium and to our car, I was encouraged by dozens of fans I didn’t know. “We’ll see you back Sunday night…we’ll get ‘em back here in Phoenix.” There were 25,000 friends walking those streets. How fantastic is that? Sports break down a cities walls so that absolute strangers are able to encourage one another and show compassion.

By the time Candyce and I got to our car, I was overwhelmed with by how much the team fought in that game. They were undermanned, but they fought with every fiber of their bodies. They left it all on the floor, and few people in this world really know what that’s like. Even though I was discouraged, sitting in my car beneath that humming street lamp, I had such a profound respect for the tigers that are the Phoenix Suns. Victory or not, they were tigers.

:::

Earlier this season (sometime after the All-star break?), ESPN ranked people throughout the NBA according to different statistics. Steve Nash was ranked number one in fist bumps: putting his fist out to his teammates as a sign of encouragement on the court. He gave the other people high-fives, encouraging words, whatever was he showed connection with the other players on the team. This is important because players have feelings too. Teams have spirit, a collective self-esteem between all the players and coaches. You need a team leader who can contribute to that spirit and to make that team better. You’ll never see Steve Nash angry at his teammates. He never shouts at his guys on the court, even if they miss an easy shot.

I’ll never forget a situation earlier this season when Raja Bell shot an air ball from behind the three point line. This is rare because this is where Bell hits most of his shots, but this season he’s been off. Steve Nash understands that he has to build up Raja Bell’s confidence, just like all of us understand one another need a boost of confidence. So after Raja Bell missed a three pointer, Steve Nash scrambled for the rebound and dished it back out to Bell, still standing at the three-point arch. Of course Bell drains the three, team runs back to the other side of the court and high-fives fly. How many people would offer someone redemption like that?

This season I got to see this up close. I had good seats, maybe 20 rows up from the court behind the scorer’s table. I watched two of the Indiana Pacers bench players walk up to the table and got ready to check into the game. They both slowed down caused stepped over something and then stood patiently at the sideline until they could go in. I wouldn’t have noticed this as anything eventful, but a few seconds later, Steve Nash stepped up to the table. He reached down and picked up a piece of paper and handed it to guys behind the table.  How awesome is that? Those guys thought they were too big too cool and too important to do something as silly as picking up a piece of paper. But apparently the leagues 2-time MVP isn’t too important.

There’s no doubt Nash will leave a legacy in the NBA. He’s still writing that legacy every time he bounces the ball on the court. So nobody knows for sure how his story will be told. But it is undeniable that he possesses a certain magic that take the game to the next level. Anyone with eyes to see knows that he leads a team unlike any team of this generation.

Next season, we’ll see this team do it again.

All of my roommates are moving out this week. My house always has the most drama on the block—the most cars out front, the rowdiest parties in the backyard. But over the past month, it’s gone over the top. For my wedding, there were dozens of cars in and out of my driveway every day. Now the guys are all moving out, so the driveway is loaded with four cars and a huge U-Haul.

Since there are 3 guys moving out, they’ve each recruited a distinct group of friends and family members to help them out. This mob of people has taken over my house, making laps up and down the stairs with stacks of brown boxes. I feel like I’m in the early scene of Home Alone when Kevin’s extended family has turned his house into chaos.

I need to get this out about Home Alone. There’s a scene early in the movie where the pizza deliver boy defends the $140 bill to Kevin’s dad by explaining that it’s 14 pizzas at $10 per pizza. I was 12 when I saw that scene, and I couldn’t imagine the big city life where pizzas actually cost that much money. Everytime I ordered pizza from then on, I’d think about that scene, wondering when that magical day will come where I paid double digits for a single pizza. In the 17 years since I first saw that movie, it hasn’t happened once.

This afternoon after the Suns beat the Lakers (now we’re up 3 games to 1), I started getting high on the thought of getting rid of clutter in the house that isn’t mine. One habit of my daily life is constantly getting rid of things that I no longer need. On any given week, I spend 2 hours getting things out of my house: donating, trashing, and recycling. Maher does this about once every 2-6 years. When I’m on one of my purging expeditions through the house, I always have to stack his stuff in the corner because I can’t get rid of it. It hit me that I could do a purging finale, the greatest of all purgings.

The project started simple, but quicky got out of hand. This house has about six versions of the same kitchen utensil. So if you have a golden brown grilled cheese sandwich that you need to flip, you can use any of the six spatulas. Since our household is so trendy, they’re each half black and half stainless steal. So I emptied dozens of utensils out of the drawer and sorted them out on the countertop, the same way you’d organize a deck of cards. I kept one of each, eight total. This was so outrageously satisfying that I kept going through the kitchen, one drawer and cabinet after another.

Three hours later, I had packed up three large boxes with pots, pans, cups, coffee mugs, and storage containers.

I emptied the junk drawers of all of Maher’s technostuff: iPod accessories, microphones, CDs, and dozens of AA batteries. I looked at the DVD cabinet like a cheetah looks at an impala. I organized and sealed up three boxes of sci-fi movies that I never have to see again. (Finally!) The only things that were mine were some episodes of the Real World Road Rules Challenge and a season of The Simpsons. I have so many empty drawers now. I knocked out half of the books on my shelves. Now there’s no books on music, only books about design and religion.

All in all, I got rid of at least 400 pounds of stuff today. Awesome.

I kind of feel like a Dad whose kids are moving out of the house. They’re all off to the next chapter in their life. I wave goodbye at the driveway then step back in the house, lock the door, and keep watching the NBA playoffs. My life is comfortable because I’ve worked hard to make it that way.

Tonight the Suns beat the Mavericks in double overtime. These are the two best team in the NBA, and this game proved to be the most exciting game of the year. What made the victory so sweet is that we were outscored in the 3rd quarter 38-16, which helped put us in a 15 point hole in the 4th quarter.

At this point in the game I knew my perfect day had gone horribly wrong. I showed up at Zipps promptly at 5:00 PM for the game, only to see an empty sports bar. All six waitresses told me in unison that the game was at 7:00 PM. I came back home and did some more work. Two hours later I stepped into a Zipps again, except this time it was a packed house staring up the final minutes of the first half were ticking down. I was so angry that I became sick and almost threw up at half time.

(It hard to write about a day that involved a sports game because I feel like I have to be a sports writer. I don’t have the patience to write like that and people don’t have the patience to read about it. So I’ll just stick to my experience of the game, not the game itself.)

This game was super exciting because it was a battle of the  top two MVP candidates: Steve Nash and Dirk Nowitski. Steve Nash scored 10 points in the last 55 seconds of the game. Let me say that again: Steve Nash scored 10 points in less than 1 minutes. Steve made every play his team needed to come out with a victory. He stole the ball, forced turnovers, drew charges, found the open man. Shoot, he even made the defensive rebound that allowed the final second tick off the clock for the victory. He was awesome. Unstoppable.

I was at Zipps with 100s of other fans and I celebrated like a madman. I have no desire to be cool about winning. I yell and pound my chest. I give strangers high fives and hugs. Why? Because I love the Suns. And when and where can a grown up have such raw and real emotion? Zipps was boiling with the joy of victory at the end of the 2nd overtime. It was party!

The Bizarre After Party

Candyce is out in California for the rest of the week, so I had to celebrate on my own. That was until my house filled up with friends who wanted to watch the newest episode of Lost. That party was interrupted by a stocky Indian who knocked on my door and told me he was out of gas. (This is a very Lost-like thing to happen.) His behavior was odd, so I kept two friends close by as I walked out of the garage to his car. At this point he was peeing in my yard. I thumped the can of gas on my shoulder and scolded him, “You can pee on a man’s yard and expect him to give you free gas!” He apologized and began walking away from my palm tree before he had finished his business. It wasn’t pretty.

He drove a beat-up Bronco, a gray version of what OJ got in trouble in. I opened up his gas cap and turned up the can and let it chug. Ten seconds later, and he had his shirt off and started flexing for Nick. Apparently he wanted to have a flex-off with my stocky roommate, but Nick wasn’t up for it. It was bizarre seeing this chubby Indian man flexing his flab in front of my house by the light of my garage. I nodded my head to show how impressed I was.

This little big man proved to be not so bright. I pulled my car around to give him a jump. As his Bronco charged, he explained that he has trouble with his battery because his massive sound system kills his alternator. Thirty seconds later he hopped behind his wheel, fired up his car, and then turned up his Bob Marley loud enough to shake the neighbor’s windows. This, of course, killed his car. The street went dark and silent. The three of us stood their in disbelief by how stupid this guy was.

We had to start all over again. Ten minutes later he was rolling and chugging out of the neighborhood. No woman no cry…